This custom walking cane features Cocobolo, walnut, maple, burled walnut, stabilized malachite, and a hand carved walnut Horse’s Head on the handle.

Horse Head Walking CaneSerial Number #2011-03Height: 38” tall.

This custom walking cane has been SOLD.If you would like to custom order something similar, email for more information at:email: mark@decoustudio.com

I couldn’t get any decent light today for photos (cloudy days work the best), and this sunset light makes everything look a little more red than normal, but it did bring out the grain in the beautiful cocobolo wood.

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Project Story:I built this cane and carved the Horse Head Handle for a “commission”, but then I needed to find another buyer once it was finished.You see…..I messed up.

A lady contacted me about ordering a new cane for a Priest that she works for, since he broke the cane he was using….the one that had a Horse’s Head on it.

She has waited patiently for many, many, months, and I finally got around to carving the new cane with a “Horse’s Head” on the handle….just like I remembered that she wanted.

When I was finished with the cane, I sent her an internet link to the photos, and waited for her response.

She responded that it was a beautiful Horse Cane, but that she wanted a “Bear Cane.”

Skreeeeech!

I apparently didn’t read her email well enough…..she wanted a Bear Head carved on this new replacement cane for the Priest. Ugh, I just messed it up. I went back through the correspondence and sure enough, in her first email, she clearly says that she wants a “Bear”.

I would have kept the Horse Cane for myself…...but I have bills to pay, you know how that is? So I put the walking cane in Hatman Jack’s Wichita Hat Works shop in Wichita, and in 2-3 weeks someone bought the Horse out of the hat shop.

So, all ends well that sells well I guess.

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Horse Carving I’ve never tried to carve a horse’s head before. I actually underestimated it a little.I’m not much of a carver, I struggle at times to get what I want from the wood. It’s not the wood, it’s me and my hands, and my inability to see details I want.So, this horse was quite a task for me.Carving comes so easily to some…..I’m jealous, in the sense that I recognize their God-given ability, and purpose to try harder on my own work.But, horse heads have a lot of details that have to be just right.If you don’t get the details just right, there are a lot of other animals it may look like….

Frank Family Feedback (FFF):After the first two days of work, I took the handle into the wife to get some input. I knew something was wrong with it, but after staring at it for so many hours, I just couldn’t see it.My wife looks at it for about 5 seconds and says, ”I’m sorry to say, but it looks like a hippo.” Then, she turns back to the TV, something important is happening….it’s another FoxNews Alert. That’s my cue…..back to the shop.

“A Hippo, Really?”, I question myself.Ouch! Maybe a skinny hippo if you squint your eyes really hard, but she was right, my horse needed some more work.

I remember back about a dozen years to some family feedback, when my Mom held up a scrimshaw powderhorn I had just finished…... upside down and declared, ”This is a nice looking beaver picture.”

”Mom, turn it over, it’s supposed to be a Bugling Elk,” I said then.

Ouch, that one hurt, but sure enough, upside down it did look sort of like a Beaver. Mom was right then. Wife was right this time.Seriously, doesn’t feedback like that make us better? I think so. Still hurts though, doesn’t it?

I fixed that “Elk” artwork then, and this time I went back to work on the horse some more. The nice thing about scrimshaw artwork, if you don’t like it, sand it off and start over. The nice thing about doing the “wrong” cane is that I have something to sell just in time for Christmas.

See, there’s a bright side to every valley…... sometimes you have to look for it, and it can be humbling.Someone once wrote, “Pride cometh before a Fall.” I need the humbling, I don’t like Falls.

Ok, back to the Horse….....I didn’t have the nose, nostrils, ears, eyes, and under-jaw right at all. The Wife was right, it did have sort of a skinny hippo-esqu-ness (spell check hates me) about it.

So, back to the shop, and a couple more days of work and I had it ready for The Wife review again.

”Oh, much better, looks like a horse now,” she tells me, and stares back at FoxNews on the TV.That’s my cue…..she’s busy…. take the compliment and get back to the shop to finish up the walking cane.

Not completely sure of myself, I ask my daughter, ”What does this look like Rachel?” ”Oh, that’s a horse, what else could it be?” she assures me.I respond, ”Your mother said it looked like a hippo before I fixed it.” ”MOM! You hurt dad’s feelings, this doesn’t look like a hippo,” she calls out through the house, “It looks just like a horse dad, very nice work…”, she assures me.

Gotta love a daughter like that. Makes you wonder if she’ll always be like this to me? I hope. “Lord, please don’t let me do something boneheaded that destroys this little girl’s heart…” I pray.

But my daughter can be a little too complimentary, so I go to find my son.

Playing with Action Figures?I find my son playing on the floor in his bedroom.”Son, what animal does this look like?”, I inquire as he looks up from playing with Star Wars figures.”It’s a horse, of course…..wanna play Star Wars with me?”, he asks.

I wish I could say that I took a short break from the shop to play Star Wars, but I didn’t.

As I write this, I wonder how a dad could turn down an invitation like that? But, I did.

Remember that old Harry Chapin song? ”And the cat’s in the cradle and the silver spoon, Little boy …” That song haunts me from time to time as I struggle to juggle all of the balls I have in the air. Know what I mean?Makes a tear come to my eye, as I ponder how short a span of time I have with this boy in my home…..

“Oh Lord, Help me to handle the priorities in my life, help me see what’s really important…and do it,” I pray.

So, with all the input, and self-conviction, I hope you agree it looks like a horse now, at least a little like a horse.

With all of our calls to each other “to get in the shop”, who do you need to stop and play with first?

Another day in the life of a home craftsperson…..Thanks for reading along and looking at my project,Mark DeCouwww.decoustudio.com

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Cane Sample Slideshow: To hear Music, click the Speaker Icon

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More Walking Sticks & Canes:If you go to my Mark DeCou Website you won’t find very many canes pictured there. I do realize that I need to invest in improving my website, but until that is accomplished, here are few more of my canes posted at lumberjocks, thanks for your patience.

You can contact these gallery stores directly and see what they still have in stock. They will ship to you if you buy something. If you prefer, you can also email me, as I keep fairly current on what is “unsold.”

I enjoy sculpting walking canes. Some folks call them Folk-Art Canes, while others call them Artisan Canes, some call them Carved Canes, while others call them Walking Sticks. There is quite a bit of argument about whether something should be called Sculpture or Carving. They could be considered Functional-Art, which is the type of work that I am usually drawn to. No matter what these canes are called, they seem to bring joy to the owners, and I have been asked to make quite a few of them in the past 5-6 years.

I started making canes on the request of a nice married couple I met on a church-building short-term mission trip to Mexico City in the early 1990’s. Several years after our trip, their son-in-law was diagnosed with bone cancer, and so they wanted to get him a specially made cane that he would enjoy using. They had heard from others that I had quit my corporate office job and started doing woodworking full-time. So, they contacted me to make his cane.

Sadly, I also built him a casket, another first for me, about a year later

Since the time I did that first Cane for Bryan, I have enjoyed the work on the canes that I have been able to make, but more importantly, the people that I have been able to meet and help along the journey. I do make a bunch of unique items and furniture, but without a doubt, I receive more correspondence and thank-you cards from cane customers than any of the other items I make, combined. So, they are fun for me to build, and I look forward to each new person and situation.

To keep a handle on all of the memories, I engrave a small serial number on each brass cane tip, and then I keep a detailed database log of each cane, customer, and situation. The list always brings me warm memories each time I scan it and remember the folks that have supported my work over the years, and vice versa.

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Still Want to See more of my work?

Start with each of these links, and they will take you to other organized lists of my other niche products:

Hey! It’s a HORSE of Course! I understand the issues with carving the horse, as I had similar problems doing my first horse head cane. The books I referred to and online photos made things even more complicated, as there are dozens of breeds of horses and each has their own unique flair. My problem was not making the horse look like a dog or a cow. Hippos can be trimmed down, take too much off and you’ve got a giraffe.

Nice job!

-- "They who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night." ~ Edgar Allan Poe

yep for sure it is one beautiful horse head…..but, as you know you need a bear…so now lets see you do a bear as good as you did the horse, which im sure you will be able to do…bears head are sorta like a pigs, but a lot more hair, bigger teeth and a broader forehead…but you know that also..i know you will do well with the bear, you do beautiful work, we all make mistakes…i hope the lady who ordered it will now wait for the right one…cant wait to see it…...live and learn huh…...its all ok…when it comes down to what is really important in life, this is just not one of them…so no sweat…...grizz

Nice cane Mark Too bad it’s the Wrong animal !!!!Sounds like some thing I would do. I always have Steph double check what I’m suppose to be making I’ve found the old memory it’s not what is used to be.Now get to work on the BEAR!!!!!